Chapin Mesa Museum-Corn for the Ages

There isn’t much broken pottery to notice along the trails in Mesa Verde but the Chapin Mesa Museum has a good display. The interpretive information explains the experimentation and development of pottery from the simplest forms to the most complex. There are also explanations of the ingredients and techniques used.

There is a good display of corrugated pottery including how it was made. Corrugated is one of the most common types that a hiker might find on trails in the region around Mesa Verde. The information here says that corrugated pots were often black with soot, indicating that they were used for cooking. The sizes vary greatly and are globular or egg-shaped with thin walls.

In the Mesa Verde collection there is one Red Ware example, with the comment that these are not common at Mesa Verde and was probably traded from southeast Utah or northeast Arizona, around Kayenta. One of the sites to visit in the adjacent Ute Mountain Tribal Park is called Red Pottery Village, perhaps a village rich in Red Ware.

There is a special display of a pot that was found filled with 31 pounds of corn, the most ever found at one time. The pot is described as being of a type that was made between 1200 and 1272. This may be the Mesa Verde Black on White. The Anasazi Heritage Center Museum in nearby Dolores, CO has more information on the types of designs that are found in this area.

There was a small display of pottery shards on display at the Spruce Tree House site, though the ranger led tour did not call attention to them. These small displays are common at ruins sites in the region. I asked the ranger about pottery making sites at the cliff dwellings, as they are usually not pointed out, even though pottery is one the main artifacts that we see and it was widely traded. He said look for small structures that are soot covered on the inside and that there might be one to find at the Cliff Palace site.